ElbowDeep in Memories
by DecaniTrebleEight
Summary: Twenty-five years on from the end of the second Cylon War, Bill Adama is forced to face some home truths and come to terms with his past. Canon when I wrote it but AU post-finale.
1. The Beginning of the End

**Disclaimer: ****Trust me on this one, I wouldn't be posting on here if I owned BSG, I'd be too busy with sacking the majority of the actors on the show or reducing their character's parts to non-speaking roles so I could exercise the fantasies of my Rodama obsessive brain. As it is however, they are the property of their respective owners and I'm just borrowing them for the purpose of this story; they will, in due course, be returned to the brilliance that is RDM. **

**A/N: S****o here you have it - the incessant ramblings of a bored teen who is so socially inept that she spends all of her time watching and squeeing over countless episodes of Battlestar Galactica.**

Oh, and plus, I didn't use a beta, purely because I prefer my work to be entirely my own (but really because I'm so impatient that I always end up posting the original before I get the story back anyway. My attention span is next to nothing). All the mistakes are my own (:

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Bill Adama sighed as his eyes traced the contours of his bedroom ceiling for what seemed like the millionth time. He had been looking forward to this day for a while, pleased at the chance to see his grandchildren, but now as he lay on his rack (bed, he reminded himself), he wasn't sure whether he wanted to get up. His son had had two daughters, named in remembrance of those he had once known – Calliope Louanne, or Cally for short was the eldest at twenty-two and her sister, Billie Hera had followed four years later. There was always a pang of something he wasn't entirely sure of; guilt, perhaps, when he heard their father call for them, feeling the gap where he thought another's name should be. Maybe he was selfish for thinking that the girls' names should've more rightfully included that of the one who was most precious to him. But who was he to question the judgement of a parent? He had certainly never been the prime example of fatherhood and he was under no illusions about that. But he could never quite get over that initial feeling of emptiness when he saw them. He knew this was wrong, that he shouldn't experience anything but unconditional love when he visited his only grandchildren, the last to carry the Adama name, but he couldn't help it. Just as you couldn't help who you fell in love with, he snorted to himself in contempt. At that moment, he heard the doorbell ring and finally steeling himself, swung his legs out of bed. It was going to be a long day.

Two hours later, the four of them were elbow-deep in cardboard boxes, sorting through dusty memoirs of a life that had been forgotten about long ago and possessions that hadn't seen the light of day in years. Despite Bill's protests, Lee and his daughters had insisted that they clear out his attic, one of those jobs that were always on the top of his "to-do" list, but that he never quite got around to starting. The girls and their father had turned up on his doorstep, dressed in old clothes and armed with various tools of the cleaning trade and demanded entry. The elder Adama had raised one eyebrow; aware that he had been the victim of a conspiracy that had been cleverly devised so that there was no way he could squirm out of it. However, that wasn't without want of trying, but he ran out of half-hearted excuses fairly quickly, knowing how stubborn the trio could be when they set their minds to it. Bill was incredibly wary of what was up in that room though, knowing that his grandchildren had no idea about his career in the military, believing him to have been a lawyer. This had been easy enough to pull off using his father's law books and certificates, and it had been decided very early on in Cally's life that she shouldn't be subjected to the horrors of war beyond what she learned in her history lessons. The lie had been so easy to pull off considering the fact that the girls believed their grandfather's given name to be Joseph, not William and so had never really questioned the prominence of Admiral Adama, with the one time they had asked about the coincidence being squashed fairly quickly. That was when they had been seven, and the subject hadn't come to light since.

The truth had become more difficult to comprehend as the years wore on, and Bill had somewhat accepted that they would never know who he really was, and that brought with it a great source of comfort for him. It wasn't that he particularly wanted to deny the girls to their true ancestry but as time went on and he became older he visited the past more and more infrequently, preferring to "live in the moment" as it were and not think about things that were, or dwell on things that could have been. Now though, he was met with the quiet confidence in the eyes of his son and he knew that there was no going back, they were going to find out and he was going to have to relive the whole saga – the triumphs, the defeats, the pain and the grief that naturally came with anything remotely connected to war – and his story wasn't just any, it was one of great importance in the survival of humanity and he had to now tell two of the people that he held most dearly in his heart a quarter of a century on. It wasn't that he couldn't remember, he could recall the events of those years more vividly than he could yesterday but it was the terror of what he and his son were about to subject them to. Taking a deep breath, he waved them in and paused a moment to collect his thoughts before closing the door and tramping up the stairs after his family.

Billie was sat on a pile of old clothes, giggling helplessly at the childhood photos of her father sipping "tea" from his little plastic cup, legs crossed and clad in swimming trunks, surrounded by a whole array of different teddy bears. What really tickled her though wasn't the haughty glare he was aiming at the lens or the clear distaste of his domestic antics being caught on camera; it was his little finger which was stuck up, mirroring that of a dignitary or socialite.  
"Wow, Dad, you really were a conceited little four-year old," she quipped, and it didn't take her father long to figure out what she was looking at. In the short but furious fight that ensued, Bill managed to slip from the room unnoticed, his pretense of fetching tea and biscuits ready if anyone came to find him.

Traipsing back down the stairs he came to sit on the bottom step and buried his face in his hands, realising that he couldn't escape from the reality anymore, knowing that he'd have to face the events of twenty-five years ago before the day was out. Hearing the creak of the landing up above him he sighed, marvelling at how quickly someone had noticed his absence and come to seek him out. A few moments later he was joined by his son and he sighed, waiting for the lecture that was sure to come. However, for the few minutes that followed they simply sat there in amicable silence, enjoying each other's company.

When Lee finally moved to speak, as his father knew he would, Bill held up a hand.  
"I know," he said resignedly, his husky tones capturing the concentration of his companion. "I know that I have to tell them, I'm well aware that it's the right thing to do but it's just hard. We've denied them the truth for so long and to be honest, I've savoured it. The last thing I want to do is remember, Lee."  
"Yeah. I feel the same. But avoidance has just made it worse Dad, we need closure and we need to finally acknowledge what happened, so our friends can be put to rest in our minds at last. Well, that's how I feel anyway."  
"You know what son, you're right. Your speech-writing has got significantly better since you gave up your wings though, I have to give you that." Lee grinned at that, his wicked smile prompting a snort of laughter from his father.  
"Come on then," he continued, "let's get this over with."

"Calliope, Billie, your father and I have something we need to show to you." The siblings exchanged wary glances at the use of Cally's given name, knowing that their grandfather was either mocking them or talking about something serious – and judging by the look on his face, it wasn't the former. Bill made for the opposite end of the room, his walk only slightly hindered by a limp, the only blatant sign of his eighty-six years. Time had been kind to him, and his hair was still as dark as it had been twenty years before, if a little thinner. They did never understand his insanely high fitness levels however, or the fact that he could beat them in a test of stamina and strength any day of the week. They learned after a while to not probe into his past, opting to let their incessant curiosity lie. The two watched as he pulled a dust sheet off a misshapen pile of objects leaning against the far wall, strategically positioned in the shadows so as to not be that noticeable – they had never paid any heed to them in their numerous trips to the attic when they were children, their father trying to dampen their spirit for adventure by engrossing them in the somewhat embarrassing memoirs of his childhood. Bill shifted a few boxes before turning to look at them pointedly. When they didn't take the hint, he let out an audible sigh before saying,  
"Well? Aren't you going to help?" The girls shrugged, in perfect unison, an identical glitter in their eyes, taking pleasure in the harmless banter with their grandfather.  
"What's in it for us?" Cally piped up, all too willing to play along.  
"You shouldn't question my decision, you should respect your elders. Calliope Louanne Adama, get off your lazy ass and come and assist an old man! Same goes for you young Billie." Cally grinned, going to drag one of the boxes out into the open so it could be viewed more easily. Billie followed suit but with the addition of a pout, clearly opposed to being called "young" when she had turned eighteen two months prior and was still basking in the honeymoon period of legally being considered an adult. Seeing this, her father let out a low laugh and exchanged a smirk with Bill.

The first few boxes contained nothing to really give away either Lee or his father's real pasts seeing as they held objects from their cabins, the places that the officers had strove to keep the military out of once it had become apparent that their stay on the battleship was going to be longer than any of them, with the exception of their commanding officer and his XO, had ever served before. Item after item was brought out and aired, each one bringing with it a string of memories. Bill smiled a sad smile when his box of books was opened, remembering their comfort in the last few months of war.  
"So," said Billie, turning over a statue of Athena in her hands and closely inspecting the workmanship, Bill noting with a pang of pride her concentration in her analysis, recalling the day in the not-so-distant past when she had rung him up, clearly hardly controlling her excitement as she informed him that she had been accepted into a top university on scholarship to study Fine Art, her words tumbling over each other in delight. After her sister's success in the literary world he had been worried about her younger sibling trying to follow in her footsteps and failing, seeing as she hadn't shown any real talent in any field. However, suddenly in her last year of school her amazing ability in the arts had been uncovered and they had been unexpectedly informed by her tutors that she was destined for great things. Coming back down to earth abruptly, he realised that she was looking at him expectantly. Rolling her eyes in mock scorn, she teased,  
"Honestly Grandpa, you were miles away! Must be getting old." Bill's hand found a cushion behind him and he took a playful swing at her, chuckling.  
"Watch who you're calling old!" Billie shrugged, innocently. This, in turn, earned her another swing of the cushion, which she didn't quite dodge in time.  
"Serves you right!" her grandfather said, good-humouredly. "Anyway, you were asking me something?"  
"Yeah." She squirmed slightly, knowing how her grandfather was very guarded about his past. "Erm, you were saying about telling us something? I was just wondering what all this stuff had to do with anything." Bill sighed. This was the moment of truth.

He pulled a box that was as of yet unopened towards him and motioned for the others to join him. Cally came to kneel beside him and studied it, reading the label.  
"Greys, duties and tanks," she said out loud.  
"Greys, duties… er, what?!" Billie questioned, sitting opposite them. Lee nodded to his father, prompting him to open it. Right, okay then, Bill said to himself. You've got to do this. Just get it over with. Slitting the parcel tape, he laid the scissors on the floor and then proceeded to open the flaps, inviting the girls to pull out what they found inside.

Three identical outfits were pulled out and laid on the underside of the dustsheet, so as not to muss them and they were followed by numerous other uniforms, very similar to the previous ones but instead in blue as opposed to grey. After these came about thirty brown tank tops, with the same number of grey sleeveless t-shirts appearing subsequently. Looking at everything before her, Cally looked to her grandfather for answers. In a reply, Bill started to explain.  
"Your father and I have never been entirely honest with you about what we did before you were born. I was never a lawyer, and your dad has only been one in the last twenty years or so." He sighed, deciding to go straight for the jugular. "My real name is William Adama, not Joseph, he was my father."  
"William Adama?" Cally asked, quicker off the mark than her sister, immediately noticing the gravity of the name. "But doesn't that mean…"  
"Yes. It's not a coincidence, Admiral William Adama and I are the same person."  
"What about dad?"  
"Ever hear of the pilot called Apollo?" Billie nodded. She had always been fascinated with the idea of deep space combat and so had paid particular attention when it was mentioned.  
"Yeah. He was CAG on the Battlestar Galactica and his skills in the cockpit were second only to Starbuck." Both the Adama men smiled at this.  
"That's your father." Bill waited after this, letting the two digest the information.  
"Wow…" Cally breathed, after a while. "That's a bombshell and a half."  
"Mmm." Billie seemed to wrestle with a thought for a moment, before suddenly saying, "How did Mum take this? If you ever told her before she died." Their mother's death had always been a difficult subject to broach, even if they had been really too young to remember much of the time around when it had happened. However, Lee raised an eyebrow at this.  
"Oh, come on, give me a bit of credit! The war was only just over when Cally was born, I'm not that much of a womaniser. No, your mother knew all about what I did. She was always known better by her nickname though, and in the cockpit she went by the name of Starbuck." Billie's eyes visibly widened when she heard this latest revelation and her whole face lit up.  
"Oh. My. Gods. You mean to tell me that my mum was the best viper pilot to ever pass through the Academy?!" Lee snorted.  
"Hey! Don't rub it in too much!" However, it was said with the utmost love, and they could all see it shining in his eyes. Bill though, noticed that Cally had gone quiet.  
"What's up?" he asked. In reply, she turned and pointed to two boxes right in the corner, stacked neatly.

Taking the utmost care she gently teased them out of their position and pushed them over to the rest of her family. With one look Bill knew exactly what their contents were, and they were pretty much the sole reason why he had eluded his past for so long. Both had been marked "storage" and both had had it crossed out and renamed. The first was now labelled "clothes," and the second…  
"Who's Laura?" In that moment, the first time her name had been spoken since the settlement of the Colonial fleet on Earth, all his old, repressed feelings came rushing back to him. The pain, grief and utter remorse flooded his senses and Bill closed his eyes, wishing that the boxes had remained in the corner, forgotten.  
"Grandpa?" Bill let out a long sigh. He'd been doing it a lot lately. Opening his eyes, he locked gazes with that of his granddaughter.  
"Laura? She was… my best friend, my soulmate if you go for that. She was something amazing and yet terrible at the same time. Not many people could work her out and I only came to after months of trying. She was a force to be reckoned with, wasn't she Lee?!"  
"That she was," he agreed, a sad smile hinting at the corners of his mouth.  
"Uhuh," Bill nodded, remembering.  
"So what happened to her?" He stiffened slightly, before saying simply,  
"She died."  
"Oh, I'm sorry. Before or after… yunno, the Twelve Colonies."  
"After. She did get to see Earth, once. Then it was like she was at peace – I told her I loved her, and she let go. It was a relief in the end, she'd been through so much pain."  
"Oh, Grandpa. I really am sorry. But what about dad's mum?"  
"Don't get me wrong, I loved Carolanne when I married her, but what I felt for Laura surpassed everything I've ever felt before. She was the love of my life." Opening the topmost box, Bill set out a skirted suit, completed by a pair of black heels. "I hated it when she acted all Presidential, what most people saw wasn't the real Laura."  
"A President, Grandpa?" Billie asked in disbelief.  
"No," said Cally, quietly. It was a surprise when she spoke, she had been silent since she had found the half-hidden boxes, mulling things over in her head. "_The_ President. The last one. Grandpa was in love with Laura Roslin."  
"My Gods," said Billie, "this is crazy. Two legendary fighter pilots for parents, an Admiral for a grandfather and now we find out that you were on first-name terms with the last and greatest of the Presidents of the Twelve Colonies of Kobol, the one who led humanity to its salvation. It's all a bit like a bad soap, no offence!"  
"They weren't just on first-name terms, Billie," Lee cut in. "Before she died, your grandfather married her – and not only that, but she adopted me. That makes her your adoptive grandmother."  
"What…? No, come off it, that's insane, I do actually listen in History, and I swear to you, President Roslin never married."  
"Oh, I can tell you she did. But only five people ever knew of it, and two of them are in this room. The other three were Kara - your mother – Laura and the priest."  
"Whoa."  
"Yeah, whoa," Cally imitated her sister. "That's one hell of a family tree."  
"Mmm, I'd say that my friends won't believe me when I tell them, but they actually won't!"  
"Okay you two," Lee interrupted, sensing his father's discomfort. "Think you could go and make some tea? It'd be most appreciated."

He waited until the sound of their voices had faded into the background before speaking. "You 'kay Dad?" After a short pause, the reply came.  
"Yes, I think so. I just wasn't ready for that amount of questioning so soon – I thought they'd be angry, or at least disappointed in us. I didn't expect them to accept it with quite that amount of awe." Lee shrugged.  
"Even though I say it myself, they're good kids and after the settlement the remaining teachers all decided on a complete change in the curriculum. Most of it's now based on new finds on Earth, the settlement, but most prominently the First and Second Cylon Wars, the Colonial Fleet and her officers. I did have a private little laugh about the pictures they started to bring home from about four onwards, most depicting you, Kara and I in bright pink, but strangely recognisable flight suits with Laura on the outside, and after they learned about the settlement on Earth and that she'd sacrificed her health for her people there was always a little halo above her head."  
"Really?" Bill questioned incredulously. "She would've hated that, to be hailed as a saint!" His son nodded, smiling, before he continued.

"Last year, I don't know if I ever told you, the only way I found out about Billie's talent was when I tried to clear up her room and I came across her coursework. I'm telling you, the stuff she was drawing, you could've been looking through a window onto Galactica's hangar deck, the amount of detail, precision and dedication that went into those birds was absolutely amazing. I think the reason that they embraced the whole thing so easily was because in some way, they had already accepted it. To them, you'll never be Admiral Adama, I'll never be Apollo and Kara will never be Starbuck. We're just their family. Laura, however, will always hold a mystery for them, and maybe that's good. She should be remembered as the sweet, caring, kind person she was, but I think that it's enough for you and I to honour her memory in that way. For the girls, she'll always be the saviour of humanity and that's healthy. Neither you nor I will ever think of her as the President, she'll just be Laura. The girls however, will always know in their hearts and the back of their minds that she was their grandmother but they'll always have the view of their schoolteachers, of outsiders and maybe that'll finally help us to find closure. She should never be forgotten," he said, as his father moved to object, a hint of anger flashing in his eyes, "but we need to let go of the past. Move on, dad, and let yourself watch the girls grow up in peace. I've known, right from the start about how you felt about her name not being included when we christened them, but it would've been so much more painful if one of them held it while you were still grieving. This way, she can live on in your memory without tarnishing your love for others." Bill bowed his head in acceptance, knowing how true his son's words rang.

That night, as he lay on his bed gazing at the picture of him and Laura on his bedside table and mulling over a myriad of thoughts and emotions, he came to a decision. He knew he finally had closure, not just making peace with the memory of his wife but truly accepting his family as they were. He had closure on his life, and he felt no more pain or anger. He was ready, and so were his son, his granddaughters, his legacy. They could all finally let go of the past. Taking a long draft from the glass by his side, Bill relaxed back into the pillows and closed his eyes, drinking in the scent from the material he held almost possessively in his hands before letting himself succumb to rest.

He woke to the sounds of a brook, the water in the background almost singing as it rushed down its course. Tracing the ceiling he realised that he had never been in this place before, but as he took in the firs gently swaying outside and the single strand of auburn hair on the pillow beside him, he knew in his heart that he was home.

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**A/N: ****Danke schun for reading. Reviews are like little snippets of joy... =S. **


	2. Epilogue

Lee was the one who found his father curled up in his bed, his fingers laced around a simple yet striking red dress that he had seen his adoptive mother wear only once, knowing the significance of the day when she had deemed to dress in it. He was surprised at his ease to remember this fact, but more so at his readiness to accept the present situation. Lee did realise however that his acceptance had happened a long while back, and deep down he had always known they were living on borrowed time. His father didn't belong now, didn't have a place in this whole new world. He had been selfish to think he had ever really settled and too wrapped up in his own life to truly see he hadn't.

Knowing that he had a limited time before the authorities arrived, he took a once-over of the room, finding the pill bottle where he thought it would be and the last few dregs of the whitish substance at the bottom of the glass on the nightstand where they hadn't quite dissolved. Carefully, so as not to disturb anything he got on his hands and knees and reached under the bed, drawing out the flight suit that hadn't gone into storage as a last favour to his father, knowing how precious his days in the cockpit had been to him. Neatly draping it over his arm to go however, several pieces of paper fluttered to the ground. Curious, Lee picked a couple up, scanning them and slightly shocked at what he read. _Olympic Carrier. Leaving the sub-lights behind. Permitting Baltar to win the election. Not building the cabin with Bill._ His father had been carrying her regrets for her, ever since she'd died. On impulse, he tore them to pieces, one by one, finally atoning for his mother's misdeeds, however right she had been in her decisions. But as he looked over the last one, he paused, before pocketing it, feeling the gravity and emotion in his mother's words.

_Live for today, because yesterday is over and tomorrow may never come._

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End file.
